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EVER SINCE - Fight The Elements To put it lightly boys and girls, this shit blasts with awesome power. Not your run-of-the-mill satan with hemorroids growling and mindless riffing, Ever Since structure their arrangements beautifully. They add just enough darkness to be on the cutting edge, and they don't hold back on the melodic power house guitars. When I first put it on, Burning Inside starts with a kind of techno-metal intro, I said "what the fuck!", then though, holy hell does it kick in! By the ending prayers and screams, you will be on your knees worshipping and begging forgiveness. If you want some killer melody, check out Heart Of Ice, it's the music Metallica always wanted to make, pre-rehab. Over all, this stuff is some mind bending shit. The song Brainstorm, in all it's simplicity and beauty, is the chamber music of dark regions. One can hear the majesty and power of the ancient arts in Back To Life, it is haunting, and executed with technical perfection. The band and their partners have produced a unique product with a custom jewel box and insert. Someday, but not soon, this "might" leave my CD rotator. But don't count on it. If you dig ultra cool deadly metal masterpieces, this is your band

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YOUR OWN DECAY - Never Enough Speed hate metal to the core! When Your Own Decay break it down, they stomp like a T-Rex on the hunt, huge blast beats and strong searing cuts. Songs of cataclysmic death, ripping face rearrangement, lying scum and the standard raping and war, the modern black army of Your Own Decay Marches on through this too short four song disc of mayhem. There are some old school metal nods (Until You Die) and some outright brutality (Glory To Illusions) that set the stage for the articulate thrash (Machine) that will inspire pits and suicide worldwide. Can you feel the fires and smell the burning flesh? As killer as the rest are, closing song "Last One Standing" combines all the elements into a full bore metal attack. Suffer fools.

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INNER GATE - Inner Gate A varied lot here, to say the least. While Inner Gate had a minor hit this past summer on the underground music charts with "A Place Without A Ghost", an intriguing mix of many metal styles working effective together, after this most of the remaining numbers are scattered and at times disjoined arrangement wise. There's a bit more metal, such as the drunked growling of "After Your Love" (maybe it should have been titled after the beers), which I suppose is some kind of bastard love song, though I will say it manages a decent blast beat a few times. And if it wasn't for the telegraphed breaks in "Welth Darkness" plus another decent verse, we might have a winner here. "Armored Ego" starts with a great riff and kickin' back end, though it quickly becomes a weird cacophony of half baked whispers and rants. There is a cool instrument thing called "Averno", but alas, it is not enough to save, or sell, any souls. Lots of potential talent here, just needing a more concrete direction and heavier execution.

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METHARIA - Promo 2003 Beautiful italian power metal having the songs and perception to make much bigger things happen. While it might be a turnoff to some that the vocals are sung in italian, best I remember they still speak it in Italy (and in NYC too!). This does nothing to take away from what makes Metharia a great band. The tight punch of "Riflesso" with aforesaid great vocal and music melody interplay, and "Come Un' Oasi" having a big anthem style sound with more vocal character plus providing some well-fitting guitar parts, are two of the highlights of this four song set. Though the other two numbers, "Destini" and "Il Buio Della Tempesta" are not slouches in any way. "Destini" did well on it own recently on the the underground music charts, as did both "Riflesso and "Come Un' Oasi", all three reaching the Top 10 and hanging around on the charts for over half a year! I have to give a heads up to Soulfingers Rizzo for his excellent mixing on this promo as well as Box Fix's mastering work. Vocalist Luca Volani is turning alot of heads, and as he gains more strength he and his cohorts Neuro Turco and Mask on the ass kicking guitars along with Kobal Milanesi and Frank Mandolese holding bass and drum courts respectively, will be a force to behold on the international power metal scene in years to come. Lots of great bands like this, for whatever reasons, don't last, but these guys are touring throughout the americas and europe and if they can hold together, they will make it big.

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HUMAN RITUAL - Offering They come out swinging and don't stop! Human Ritual are some killer grinding motherfuckers, and they excel at super-tight triple time blasts where bands such as Raze attempted to go. Human Ritual also have the big stomp down to a science, and the vocals of Brad Oliver are in a class of their own. He can go from a demonic grown to a hellion scream to grunge parlance in a single breath. The band's rage and discontent in the hopelessness of their hometown (Topeka Kansas, first realm of hell) to their disgust in the entire human race of takers and users can be felt throughout their music. This, combined with the fire of the band's talents (Andrew Bray is nothing but a bad ass on the drums!) put Human Ritual in the top echelon of progressive grindcore metal bands from the USA. Coming from the midwest no doubt! Wonder what aunt bee and the ladies from the auxillary think about the wild shit when Human Ritual takes the stage! Hell, maybe they'll down a couple of shots and hit the pit with the skins!! Every fucking song on this disc is impressive, however "Less Than Human", "Behind The Faces", and the neo-progressive thrash of "This So Called Life" are incredible.

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KALOPSIA - Beauty Of The Defiled Jersey's death grind masters continue to take no prisoners as they scar the minds a bit more with this devastating piece of work. Kalopsia bring the blood to a boil as they deliver knockout blows with the death metal war anthem "Pleasure In Torture" as the guitars grind heads to pulp and the blast beats destroy all incriminating evidence. Strong elements of hellraising thrash are sprinkled throughout this album, showing the band's skill on the screaming biographical "Source Of Evil", complete with grinding breakdowns and old school style progressions. On "Driven By Voices" the dark groove sets the stage for evil to be conjured as Kalopsia begin the run for the gates of hell. You can hear the blast as they blow it off the doors on "Headless and Raped" with it's thrash and speed metal onslaught only slowing enough for the death curse to bubble up from the depths before the screams take you down. All this only prepares you for the vicious bombing run of "Her Obituary Reads...." which shows Kalopsia at their brutal best with great double bass work inside a framework of riffology that sounds like a screaming train wreck. Currently the band needs a new drummer to get to the next level. It'll be big shoes to fill considering the awesome work on the recording.

Website Deadsun Records 10 ruedes capucines 22300 Lannion France Management

LEX TALIONIS - Inhuman Violence Unholy fuck are these thrashers fast! While no doubt the drums are techtronic, the buzzsaw riffing and bass guitar mastery is something to behold. They add some gothic keyboards every so often, plus the hurricane like vocal assualt, this shit will leave your head spinning! First song "Sentenced To Death" is a fuckin' razor blade slicing through tendon, and hell it's "slow" compared to the next one "WarDomain", with a nice baroque piano backing up the brigades last charge, all of them knowing, they will die. All of this is not to say though that it's just fast thrasing madness (though every song has it), listen to the dark beauty of "I'll Thrash Your Grave", a better death metal love song has not been written! These guys are the killing war machine from Hell!

Website Management: Dana Forrester Heckler Ent (248) 545-4749 hecklerdetroit@yahoo.com

HAF / LIFE - Haf/Life Classic industrial metal, perfect for getting ripped to, or as a soundtrack to ripping someone's head off. They're calling it booty core, but I don't know about that. Lots of methods of firepower here, fully automatic extended magazines to tricked out scatterguns. While the CD starts off a bit slow, T 1/2 sounding like some generic NIN circa Pretty Hate Machine, cut 2 "Tipping Point" beings out the guns and the riffs that set the stage for most of the album's face value. It's still rather light on the percussion stuff, but the zombified vocals and head trippin' riffs-n-synths made this one a surprise hit on the charts recently. To be sure, something a bit deeper than out of the box drum samples would serve this band well. "Spiritual Enema" is almost ruined by a track that sounds way too much like a bastard Tone-Loc Wild Thing. The tribal blasts of "Red Meat and Sex" with it's big power chords do serve well, and the psychedelic wane of "Open Playing Field" with it's down tempo open beats make it one of this release's top numbers. We're back to the guns and killing fetish on "Shoot To Thrill", and the album ends with "Thalidamide", that is some haf / assed shit with a new order beat. If only we'd got some blood and guts for dessert! Throw away the mid-tempo boxed drums for the most part and turn up the bpm, then Haf / Life might spring forth and bite your ass off.

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NORTHERN FOREST - Northern Forest Wild and totally out of control, you don't know what to make of Malikov (frontman for heavy hitters Northern Forest) one minute he's throwing some psychedelic madness (january snow) complete with stop and start guitar, tubular bells and snide ukrainian grooves. The next he's letting all hell break loose (seryozhka_na_pupke) sounding like crazed demons running amok. There's even the downtuning and speed riffs backing Malikov as he sounds every bit the death metal master. It'll be interesting to see and hear the new stuff his band is cooking up as we speak. I wouldn't put it past Malikov and Northern Forest to start some serious shit! Trapped in an Israeli apocalypse, Malikov needs your help in running the gauntlet to freedom.

HELLZINE PAGE 4 - BATTLEHEADS

VARIOUS 2003 - UNDERGROUND